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I returned here with some friends for the happy hour specials, where appetizers are half off. There are also deals on beer and house wines, $3 wells, and $2 off the specialty cocktails and specialty shots, which are normally $8.50 and $7.50, respectively. So, YES, Killer B’s now has a full liquor license. I tried the Sunset cocktail, which seemed similar to a Cosmopolitan in ingredients. Vodka, lime, cranberry, triple sec I think. One thing that surprised me was the size. Elegant, no. Big, yes. Weak, probably, but not to me since I am a lightweight. I had to nurse my drink for nearly two hours. Serving it up in a pint glass is quite popular to the hungry crowds, the manager hinted. They also hinted of cocktail experiments taking place, trying to incorporate some of Killer B’s unique sauces with say, a signature bloody mary. Sounds good to me.
As for food, it was a share-fest. We shared a platter of sweet potato fries (yum!) and the slider trifecta, getting a chicken slider, a pork slider and a beef slider, all dressed with coleslaw and served on little toasted buns. Finally, we shared an order of deep fried mac and cheese balls. Deadly and delicious, thank goodness we were sharing. With my cocktail, 1 well drink and 3-4 beers, plus sliders and mac and cheese, the bill was $25, quenching thee people. Not bad! Now for other deal news: lunch specials! I picked up a flier for their latest lunch deal, called the Express Lunch Menu. The dealio is that the food will come in 30 minutes or less, or it’s free. The fine print: valid Monday-Friday from noon-3 pm, excluding holidays. Does not include alcoholic beverages. Dine in only, and most notify server prior to ordering that you’re “in a hurry” ya know. So what’s the food? BBQ Chicken Salad All meals include a soda and one side. Starting at $7.99 and nothing is over $10. Whattadeal, you penny pinchers, tightwads, frugal gourmets, and lunch rushers. Plus, BBQ! Killer B’s BBQ and Bar
I don’t know about you, but I’m still a little upset over JR’s BBQ closing several years back. JR’s turned beef ribs into tender meat velvet on a bone and they had great sweet potato fries. But I’m at a good point in my grief cycle and it’s time to move on. A good way to dabble in what they offer is sampling the happy hour menu. Appetizers are half off up until 7 pm, and you can try the trio of sliders for about $3.50. That’s what we got, and it includes a bbq brisket slider, a pulled bbq chicken slider and a pulled pork slider. They come on lightly toasted rolls, with a generous dollop of cole slaw sweetened with pineapple. They were all good, but with the sauces dominating the flavor spectrum it’s hard to tell which is which.
Speaking of sauces, most items already come seasoned and lightly sauced, but you can add more bbq sauce and there are several to choose from. A sweet sauce, a honey chipotle and a habanero sauce. I’m like goldilocks, I like the one in the middle.
Another item ordered from the appetizer list was the deep fried mac and cheese balls. If you’re a deep fried fan, this is a fun one to try. The cheese has a good tang to it. It comes with a spicy mayonnaise for dipping. Normally $5, and $2.50 at happy hour.
We also tried a half rack of baby back ribs, which were great, very tender while still holding structure on the bone. These came with two sides and I went for the deep fried goodness of sweet potato fries and onion rings, all tasting fine. It’s $11 for the half rack and two sides.
This was a lot of food for three people, so it’s not surprising we had some leftovers, which the folks at Killer B’s were happy to provide a takeaway box for. Aw, what a cute little slider in a big cavernous box. People who’ve had Memphis style bbq, or Kansas City bbq in Memphis or Kansas City grouse that Killer B’s is not either, but I doubt that Killer B’s is trying to be just like those places. Hey, I don’t say your fried rice is bad because you don’t make it like my mom’s fried rice. The guy working the smoker has his way of doing things, and the fact that there *is* a smoker on site to barbeque the meat is pretty cool, and I like the food that came out of it. At the time I visited, Killer B’s could serve beer and wine. But soon they’ll have a full bar license with proper cocktails. Technically, they consider themselves a sports bar, which isn’t really my thing, but the convenient location, the access to bbq made on site in a large smoker and the temptation of a cocktail would keep me coming back. Killer B’s BBQ and Bar This is a followup to my post a few days earlier about Silvergreens’ Burger and Beer special. Before I’d gotten the avocado, sundried tomato burger. Today the Nymphaea gang and I tried some of the other burger selections.
This is supposedly one of Silvergreens’ simpler burgers, the cheeseburger. BUT! There’s a choice of cheese and the options are way better than the usual cheddar or American cheese. There’s the above two, but also swiss, jack, blue cheese or goat cheese. I got the goat cheese and this tasted great!
But I can imagine that the popular burger most others order is the bacon cheeseburger. Because…bacon. Here, the cheese is just cheddar, there didn’t seem to be an option to go with anything else. And the idea of offering this great burger and beer special is that there aren’t any substitutions. But like I said, there’s bacon in there, which makes the burger close to nirvana without having to faff over little details of cheese. Once again, the deal is any burger and beer on their menu is just $6 from 3-7 pm, 7 days a week. A soda or ice tea can be substitute in place of beer. Or wine for $2 supplement. Silvergreens (two locations) 900 Embarcadero del Mar,
Silvergreens is one of those places that I’d eaten at before and had the unfortunate experience of ordering the wrong thing. I’d gotten the “half and half” option of half a sandwich, with salad and cookie – which is actually good – but I picked the bread as baguette, convincing myself that something baked in-house had the probability of being good. However, it had a rock hard crust and was really difficult to eat. There was no way I could get an actual whole bite of sandwich in my mouth, I had to eat it open face, and it still tore up my mouth, while also putting my nose into the nest of mayonnaise and sprouts on the top of the sandwich. I’ve since learned that their honey-wheat bread is the way to go. It’s softer, tastes good, and has more fiber. So I went to Silvergreens recently to check out their “happy hour” special offering a burger and a beer for $6. This deal is available from 3-7pm, 7 days a week. It’s any one of the burgers on their menu and any bottle of their beer, or you can pay $2 more for a glass of wine instead of the beer. The burger selections are nice. I got the sundried tomato and avocado burger, that’s normally $6.99 a la carte. There’s also a pepper jack cheese and bacon burger, a pesto burger, cheeseburger, and a classic plain burger. Beer options include Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, Blue Moon Belgian White Ale, Firestone, Corona and more. There is an option to get a non-alcoholic beverage in place of the beer, and note: Beer is only available to dine in, you cannot get any alcoholic beverage to go. I wanted my meal to take away, so I selected a San Pellegrino Limonata, but could have taken ice tea or some other drink.
The burger was nicely composed, using the tasty honey-wheat bun; the beef was cooked by default as medium, with a little pink in the middle. The sundried tomato added a lot of flavor to the burger, and the avocado made it nice and creamy. The bun was cut a little thick in places, but that helped it hold up the heft of the juicy burger. I also liked the use of spinach as the greens instead of the normal iceberg lettuce.
Other things I liked about Silvergreens: * Itemized nutrition information printed on my receipt. The meal cost $6.53 after tax, it was 728 calories (150 was the Limonata) with 4 grams of fiber, 30 grams of fat and 36 grams of protein, and the table showed what percentage this contributed to a 2000 calorie or 2500 calorie diet. * Free coffee refills, after your first purchase of a coffee, and reusing the paper cup provided with that first purchase. I had some friends working nearby, and they had wandered over to Silvergreens throughout the day for top-ups on their coffee. * The coffee and ice tea served there all came from Green Star, a local purveyor specializing in fair trade coffee and tea. And remember, free refills. * The interior is bright and tidy; the fellow working the counter was super friendly. Overall, rather nice and a very good deal. I’d originally accompanied my friends, who were there for the coffee, but once I’d gotten the burger, they came back later for those, too. They all ate dinner for about $6.50 each and it provided lots of energy for everyone working late into the night on the Nymphaea art installation for the SBIFF opening party. Silvergreens (two locations) 900 Embarcadero del Mar, We met up for happy hour cocktails with Wayne, our old tiki friend from the Mai Tai throwdown during EpicureSB in 2009. I had work, and was running a little late, but the boys kept the seat warm for me, and were plenty warmed up themselves on the first round of cocktails. Arch Rock Fish is an interesting place. First, the god awful name. The attempt to shibboleth a channel islands landmark results in everyone sounding like they have a lisp, it’s not intuitive to say, and I’ll guess that their target audience does not know anything about Arch Rock or cares. I could abbreviate it. ARF. Okay, dogs. Actually, if someone said “arf arf arf” I’d guess they were trying to say Arch Rock Fish. But if they can turn a bad feng shui space into something productive while the Melting Pot fell by the wayside, then cool. I’d walked by a few times and had trouble counting the fauxhawks, too many of them. But the Blush/Marquee folks do have some interesting signature cocktails and that’s enough to get me to poke my head in.
My one and only cocktail that night was the Red Rocks. I wish I could tell you what’s in it, but since the menu online is a gif, it’s impossible to cut and paste.
Next round: Tangerine Falls (named after the hiking spot, not because there’s tangerine in it, because there isn’t), the Lolita Rita, and the Buena Vista otherwise known as an Irish coffee, but I think it’s called the Buena Vista because it’s served in a glass they nicked from the Buena Vista in SF. Favorites: Red Rocks, the Irish Coffee, and the Tangerine Falls. We’d picked coming to Arch Rock Fish over its bar partner because it had a better selection of appetizers, which are essential to keep us from getting too loopy. The boys had ordered something before I arrived, so I missed that. But we did get three other nibbles, all offered at reasonable prices from the happy hour menu.
Ted had tried the salmon deviled eggs before and liked them, so we got a set of those, $3. We also got a little bowl of peel and eat shrimp, $5. They are a little messy, but they keep your hands busy, and the shrimp tasted just right.
Finally, we had a sushi roll and I couldn’t tell you at the time what it is, because there is so little fish in it that it’s just not possible to taste any fish. Do you see that odd sliver that might look like light or shadow on one side of the roll? That is the fish! I do recall that these slices were quite big and if you ate one you had to forgo conversation for several minutes because it took a while to chew it all down. It wasn’t that good. Now that I’m at home and can see the menu online clearly, I see that it’s a spicy tuna and salmon roll, $6. Hmm, next time I would try items like the grilled cheese, grilled artichoke and fish tacos. Arch Rock Fish This is kind of embarrassing, I don’t even remember why I was here. But I did have a few nibbles. The happy hour menu’s changed since I last sampled the goods. For one, the menu’s no longer $4 per item, it’s simply $2 off the regular item, so some items aren’t such deal anymore.
The mac and cheese dropped in price, however. The regular price was $5, so the new happy hour menu brought it down to $3 whereas the old menu was only $1 off.
And something new, a plate of toasted pita and hummus. There were two kinds served – a hummus with sun-dried tomato, and a hummus with caramelized onions. It was probably in the $5 range. Reds Our desire to come here was driven more by our hunger than our desire for another cocktail. What are we on, a pub crawl? No. Sabrina had planted the seed when she thought Coast had $2 tacos on Tuesdays. At the time I thought she was confusing it with Sharkeez’s tacos on Tuesdays (no thanks). But then I spied on the Canary Hotel’s twitter that there was a taco deal, all day on Thursdays. So she was close. It was getting late, and this is a great option for a cheap and cheerful meal, while in an elegant surrounding. Of course this doesn’t beat the whole-in-the-wall taquerias on price and street food authenticity, but for a higher end hotel, I thought it was great. There are very few hotels I dine in, mainly because I don’t ever need to stay in a hotel in Santa Barbara, but this is one I’ve been to a few times now. The chef participates in many food and wine fundraisers, so I get the skinny on his passion and creativity from there. I still can’t say I feel entirely comfortable there, I think that may be part of the hotel atmosphere where most people are passing through. The bartenders do double-duty as psychologists or buddies, with a patient ear for travellers’ woes. When the bill comes, the staff seem surprised to learn I’m actually just here for the food or a drink, I’m not staying at the hotel. Still, I like it. It’s nice to detach myself from being a Santa Barbara local and drop into an interzone of sorts. And at $2 a taco, the price is right.
First, a beverage. The happy hour menu on drinks ran until 9 pm. We walked in with about 5 minutes to spare and got a pineapple margarita, $6. This was on the menu, but the bartender could have made one other flavors. Top shelf cocktails were $8, by the way, not including the fancy scotches. The choices for tacos were chicken tacos, pork tacos (top row), and steak tacos and snapper tacos (bottom photo). They are amply portioned, served on two large-ish corn tortillas with salsa and guacamole on the side. I thought the fish, beef and pork ones were delicious, while the chicken was okay. Really, that’s the chicken’s fault for being chicken. My top pick was the pork, which resulted in us ordered a second one, but the fish and beef were by no means worse. I really liked that the steak was clearly cooked as a larger piece beforehand to medium – with lots of pink in the middle – and then chopped for the taco filling. They were good mouthfuls and remained juicy and tender. Each taco had a slight variation in filling, other than the meat obviously. The pork had grilled onions and corn, the snapper was creamy and topped with shredded cabbage. The chicken had grilled peppers and tomato, while the steak was garnished simply with fresh pico de gallo. The taco deal is all day Thursday, from 11 am – 11 pm. It was a great way to end the evening. If only I lived downtown, I could spontaneously saunter over here for a late night snack more often. Maybe even dress up! Coast Restaurant I had an appointment elsewhere in the Funkzone that afternoon and rather than schlepp myself all the way back to Ellwood for the last half hour of the workday, I hunkered down at Reds with their free wifi and finished up my work there. Turns out they have happy hour from 3-7 pm during the weekdays, and the happy hour food menu is just $4 per item. These weren’t greasy salty snack foods designed to keep a patron parched and drinking. The menu is based on their standard menu of sandwiches, bruschetta, quiche, things you and a friend can dig into or dishes you can consume solo. I ordered a couple items for myself and a few others.
I would have loved to try every dish on their happy hour menu, there are about nine items available, but there were only three of us to share the food. And then, happy hour was over and loads of people arrived to watch the video premiere. Good times! Reds So soon after my first review, I really feel the need to revisit this. Mongolian BBQ – 4 Happy Hour is M-F, 4-7 pm. The special is half price appetizers. No deals on the drinks, but they are roughly $7.50 per serving, which is a good price. The Zombie came in a cool Fu Manchu mug. The Chi Chi came in frozen coconut mugs, that were still cold nearly an hour later. The Scorpion Bowl aka Parents Liquor Cabinet (costs $15, serves 2+) comes AFLAME, and with crazy long straws. Photos of the first three drinks are below.
Mai Tai was big and delicious. King Kong Bundy (sp?) was dangerous. I don’t believe there is any other bar in town that serves up these tiki-style cocktails with the kitsch style. With my little group, we were able to sample nearly every appetizer on the menu. I’ll go through the whole list. * Chinese Chicken Salad – did not try * Fried Wontons (10 pork, or 8 cream cheese) – ordered both. Simple, fun to share, lots of dipping sauce provided. * Egg Rolls (4) – appeared vegetarian. Standard. Let these cool down before eating. * Paper Wrapped Chicken (4) – actually foiled wrapped. Stuck to foil. Meh. * Fried Shrimp (4) – good. * Bar-B-Q Spareribs (4) – yummy and filling. * Bar-B-Q Pork – did not try * Fried Dumplings {Pot Stickers} (6) – SKIP! But filling. * Sa-Tay Beef Sticks (6) – winner. * Chinese Country Style Chicken Wings (6) – good! * Assorted Appetizer {2 pieces each of: Egg Roll, Paper Wrapped Chicken, BBQ Sparerib, and Beef Stick} (8) – winner! Came in a kitschy platter with a mini hibachi flame to heat things up. * Fried Shrimp Balls (4) – has potential. Some of ours were too salty. * Salt & Pepper Sauteed Mushrooms – yummy! Great to share.
* Bon Bon Ji Chicken – WINNER! Shredded chicken in a citrus peanut sauce with greens. Can take a while to prepare, and worth the wait. * Swa-Ni Pork – WINNER! Thin-sliced pork in spicy garlic sauce. Now, don’t expect the party to fall in your lap. You need to bring your own. Ming Dynasty is not the place of beautiful people, unless it’s Goleta’s own special brand of beautiful people, which is folks in costco clothing and a mullet or two. And that’s part of its charms. We had a blast. LOVED the happy hours. We will be back. Ming Dynasty We’d just been wine tasting in the Funk Zone and needed to walk off the effects and soak up some of the alcohol with food. Poked our heads into the Bay Cafe just around the block and saw Wendy working at the bar. It was also just before 7 pm, so we made it in time for happy hour specials!
Each item on the Happy Hour menu was $5, ranging from food to cocktails. We shared a margarita, made from scratch, with lots of lime juice. For food, we had fish tacos, and buffalo wings with fries. The fish tacos come in two options, fried fish or sauteed fish. Seeing how we were about to have fried chicken, we opted for the sauteed fish. Very decent, getting two fish tacos for $5. The wings were actually “wings.” Boneless chicken breast fried and basted with the buffalo sauce. It included a ranch sauce for the chicken and ketchup for the fries. Again, $5. Perfectly decent. Next time, we’d like to try the fish chowder pot pie, which had a clever name I don’t recall, but it sounded good. But will there be a next time? I hear this business is closing, and moving onto State Street and renamed the Bay Roadhouse Bar and Grill. Not very fishy sounding. This Bay Cafe also has a fish market on one side, I don’t know if that will survive the move either. Wendy? Bay Cafe |
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